Too often, heathens who try to discuss their gnosis on heathen forums are met with derision. I created the Quartz Metaphor of Gnosis to show why I think we should be able to discuss religious experiences in a religious forum. This metaphor shows how personal gnosis becomes group gnosis. It can’t happen if no one compares notes.

This is how I was given to Sigyn earlier this year. It was my first time using my lavender extract that I made from the lavender I grew in my garden. At the time, I didn't know that I was about to need my connection to Sigyn to be very strong, because I was about to take on increased responsibilities as a family caregiver.

The first time I traveled with Tom was October 2014, on our first trip to Front Sight. I saw tons of ravens and butterflies. One might not expect a gun club to double as a wildlife refuge, but it has a lot of open land, including large undeveloped areas where people aren’t allowed. The first day out in the open desert, I saw lots of ravens. One raven flew over the range with prey in its beak. And the butterflies! Yellow ones, white ones, blue ones, brown ones, two different kinds of orange ones, even a couple of Monarchs!

Butterflies are Sigyn’s animal messengers, just like ravens are Odin’s. I took both those signs as cosmic thumbs ups.

On Sept. 1, 2014, I was making more of my runes scarves in honor of various gods. I made one for Loki, and in the part of the scarf intended to go in the back of the neck I started the pattern repeat. When I posted a picture of it a friend said it looked like a Sheila-na-Gig and that "You got Loki'd."

So I painted over it, and made it a butterfly. I needed to add runes because I had symbols and runes for Loki, and a symbol for Sigyn, so it needed runes for Sigyn. I didn’t plan out what to write, the words just flowed. Loki gave me the words and I wrote them. I didn’t mean it to, but it came out a plea for transformation.

After I finished the scarf, Sigyn appeared next to me. She approached me differently this time. Before, she had appeared across the room and rushed over, and when she touched my arm I could feel her touch, which startled me because I could not feel any other noncorporeal being's touch, and I had flinched. This time, she just appeared right beside me, and spoke.

I could hear her. I could hear her again, at last!

She had a thin cloak like a monarch wing, a little bit like a silk scarf.I thought she might intend some sort of transformation, some healing by chrysalis. In my novel, the main character transformed in a chrysalis and had to be completely dissolved into goo for it to work, and I was afraid of the process. Sigyn put a corner of the wing on my shoulder. I stiffened up but didn’t move. I knew she was trying to give me maternal love but I was so afraid I started to cry, silently.

She gave me time and returned the next night. Loki kept me still while Sigyn worked. I was briefly in a transparent chrysalis. I didn’t have to dissolve. My wings just attached to me. I still didn’t understand but I knew this was what I had asked for. What Loki had given me the words to ask for. Then he let go.

I heard Odin’s voice making that “mm” sound he makes in my book when he’s thinking. I discovered that he does that to announce his presence when he comes to me. He told me to show him my new wings. Monarch wings sprouted from my human back. And I felt my soul detach from my body.

“Spirit walking?” I asked in my head. “I already know how to spirit walk. That’s how I first met Loki as a child.”

Odin shoved my wings through my back and folded them around my soul within. The wings were for me to use after I die, not before. Then he pointed far away, through the night, and I saw a shining world far away. I thought of when Loki showed me how to get to Uppland in Jotunheim, but this was not the same world. Odin said, “That is Asgard. Now you can always find your way home. Home to me.”

Image: A photo I took of a Checkered White butterfly on a Yellow Tickseed flower in my garden.

After my 2 wedding visions, I was no longer sure where I would go when I die. For 25 years I had expected to go to Freya in Folkvangr. I had previously had a brief glimpse of Odin appearing to me at death, as I related in my post Seeing My Own Death in the Runes, but I had not really thought that I would go to him because I thought his humans went to Valhalla, and Valhalla was only for the battle dead. I don't expect to die in battle, and I would not really want to join the army after death anyway, and that's what going to Valhalla means. It's not Heaven or Paradise, it's a training base for the Last War. It did not sound appealing to me.

I didn't want to fight on the other side either. I had always expected to sit out the Last War, as Freya's dead humans are not prophesied to participate in it. I always pictured Folkvangr as a place where both battle dead and some other types of people went. And cats. I pictured cats.

A godphone is like a computer that automatically signs you into your email; if you're using someone else's and you don't know how to sign out and sign back in as yourself, you'll accidentally get their messages instead of yours. If you don't realize what happened it can be really confusing.

Continuing the story of my personal journey on my path from the part where I broke my connection with "Other-Sigyn" as related in my post My Two Weddings Part 4: Odin and Honir:

Readers of this blog have seen me write about "novel gnosis," insights I learned through writing my unpublished behemoth Some Say Fire. Talking with other writers about novel gnosis showed me that this experience is fascinatingly different for everyone. So many people were excited about the idea that it's turning into a book. I'm editing an anthology of essays about novel gnosis.